Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Tá a fhios agam go bhfuil na haonaid casta agus go bhfuil deacrachtaí ann from some people's point of view. Some people believe it is difficult and that there are specific difficulties there. I cannot speak about the particular one the Deputy raised, but in general there are difficulties. There might be an opportunity because I hear what the Deputy is saying. It would be the view of some that the aonaid are in the middle of English-speaking schools and that they are a particular aspect of those English-speaking schools. We need to do better in how we would manage that and there are opportunities, particularly in our new builds, and I do not see why we cannot reconfigure and reimagine existing builds. If the only capacity that is there is for an aonad, then maybe we should be looking at reconfiguring a building to ensure it is a stand-alone within the building. In other words, it would have its own designated entrance and exit and would be almost complete and entire within itself. There might be some areas of sharing, but in general and in principle, it would almost be stand-alone and freestanding within the bigger building. That is just a building effort but we should be able to achieve that. If we are doing it we should be able to achieve that.

On the 400-pupil capacity, we have to be clear that for a post-primary school it is between 600 and 1,000 for the establishment of an English-medium school. It has been reduced to 400 for the Gaelcholáistí, and if the 400 cannot be reached, the aonad can perhaps be looked at. That is notwithstanding that there could be difficulties with that but we should have the capacity to smooth out some of those difficulties in it having its unique identity and everything else. We can look at that going forward. Was there another point?